These are the first I've seen of the new Hasbro Marvel Legends line, and while I'm not displeased with them, I am a little disappointed. If I hadn't seen the old Marvel Legends by ToyBiz I would probably be perfectly happy with these--but I have, so I'm not, not entirely in any case. Hasbro has greatly reduced the degree of articulation, and while they are absolutely playable, they just don't have the extreme articulation that marked the ToyBiz Marvel Legends--specifically, they have no hand or finger articulation. No bendable toe, which really is nice to have for posing. The packages don't even mention articulation (and as you may recall, each ToyBiz Marvel Legend had the number of points of articulation printed on the package--it was a selling point!). (However, the packages are far, far easier to open than the ToyBiz packages, and I can't complain about that!)
Now, all those complaints are only by comparison with the old ones. Without that base of comparison, these are just fine--they have plenty of range of movement. All can sit, do side kicks, rotate arms fully, have wrist and ankle motion. All but Emma have good head and neck movement, and she really only lacks it because of her hair, which is not unusual in these figures. They are absolutely playable figures, and I would absolutely recommend them as toys.
As for how they look? Well, the ToyBiz figures were pretty variable in that respect as well, so I'm not going to criticize too much on that point.
Hercules looks great, very much as he does in the comics. He's huge--lots of muscles (with veins! :P), and the bulk does interfere a bit with his movement, but it's not terrible. The face is very well done, and he's a good addition to our collection. And he comes with a lovely phallic mace, a nice touch.
Banshee is not bad. The costume is fine, and the glider wings are cloth and removable. His mouth is open, so that he's permanently emitting his sonic scream. The paint job is all right apart from the neck joint--he's designed so that his head can lean back quite far, and since the base color of his body is apparently dark green (with the flesh tone painted over) you can see the green in the joint, which is a bit distracting. The main complaint I have about his appearance, though, is his paleness--he's fair enough to look pretty goth, which I don't recall noticing in my old X-Men books. But overall, not bad.
And then there's Emma Frost. What to say about Emma? Well, I'll start with a direct quote from the eight-year-old: "She's really way too skinny and her head's too small." The husband thinks she looks like a druggie, and she does have that heroin chic thing going for her. Tiny, narrow face with unfocused eyes, arms so slender that the elbows and wrists are wider than the rest--the twelve-year-old calls her emaciated. She does, indeed, look unhealthy, particularly when one removes her cape (as one does right away because she's easier to play with that way).
You know, when an eight-year-old--an eight-year-old who's a fan of Bratz dolls--notices and objects to the way an action figure is built, there's something extreme going on.
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